


of tight spandex and birkenstocks

by peachii



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Alternate Universe - Flower Shop, Alternate Universe - Superheroes/Superpowers, And is a yogi, Angst, Bisexual Lance (Voltron), Enemies to lovers kind of, Gay Keith (Voltron), I'm really bad at coming up with superhero/villain names i'm sorry, M/M, Pidge is the best sidekick, lance has ADHD
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-02-25
Updated: 2017-05-13
Packaged: 2018-09-26 22:02:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 5,467
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9923936
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/peachii/pseuds/peachii
Summary: Lance landed neatly in the spot the other had been, hands on his hips. “If you wanted my autograph that bad, you could have just asked!”“I don’t think your fangirls would like that,” mullet retorted.“Neither would the fanboys.  News flash, buddy: superheroes can swing both ways, and I’m not just talking about these pretty fists.”In which Lance fights crime in tight spandex, and pines after the cute flower shop employee who works across the street in burks.or, the superhero / flower shop / yoga instructor au literally no one asked for.





	1. a forget-me-not amongst the roses

**Author's Note:**

> The inspiration to write this fic came about after coming home from yoga and learning miraculous ladybug was on netflix..
> 
> hope you guys like it!!

  
Cause I can’t deal with the stress of the lifestyle  
Or the way you’re looking in my face  
And I wanna get away from it all  
But I’m drawn right back, moth to the flame

-K.Flay

 

 

“So she’s in adho mukha pose-”

“Dude, English.”

“Sorry, sorry. Down-ward facing dog pose. But not really, right? It’s totally off.”

“Gocha.”

“And I’m just one of the observers, but I can’t not notice. So I’ve gotta help her.”

“Naturally.”

“And I come behind her and tell her she’s doing it wrong. But as I’m repositioning her hips, she totally freaks out, screams that I’m a pervert, and kicks me from behind in the balls.”

“That’s rough, buddy.”

“I even _warned_ her before I did anything. So now the instructor has expelled me from observing in her classes for the next two weeks. Which means I’m back up front on the register. How unfair is that?”

Hunk’s flashed him a sympathetic but mildly amused smile on the laptop screen in front of him. The minutes at the bottom of the skype session had compiled into a total of three on-going hours now. It was far from their record, but it was definitely cutting into precious beauty sleep on the Cuban boy’s behalf. That was hard to come by lately.

Lance leaned back into his seat, sighing irritably. “It’s such a bore around here without you.”

“Miss you too.”

He began to fiddle with his chakra healing bracelet, zeroing in on the small stones as his train of thought left the station.

“Did you take your meds tonight?”

Lance looked up, blinking a few times. He shrugged. “M’fine. I’ll take them in the morning.”

Hunk quirked his brow, arms crossed over his chest. He was sporting a hoodie with a big “G” logo on the front. School pride, he assumed.

It had been almost two years since his childhood friend had left the city to attend the Garrison, an Ivy League University on the other side of the country.

Lance thought, at some point, he would have gotten used to not having the big guy around - but it never did get easier.

Part of him wished he had taken that scholarship. It would have been a selfish decision, but the world was full of selfless people like the Champion.  Surly he wouldn’t have been missed if he never made a name for himself in the first place.

There was no point in regretting the past now, though. Lance made a choice to pursue the life of a vigilante over education, and stepping down now would only hurt the city he vowed to protect - especially with its beloved hero missing in action.

His family and Hunk would never understand the trials and constant regret he faced everyday because of it, but he had already accepted that.

The life of a hero wasn’t glamorous, and it wasn’t anything like the comic books he read as a kid led him to believe.  He didn’t have a fancy apartment, and he just barely made enough money at the studio to pay rent. There was no pretty woman or man waiting for him at home when he returned beaten but triumphant, either - just a handful of obsessive fangirls and fanboys constantly at his heels who only took an interest in him when he was wearing a mask, rather than burks and yoga pants.

Not that Lance really cared. It was common knowledge that superheroes were doomed to live lonely lives; if he let himself get too attached, then he ran the risk of losing them to his foes. He didn’t want anyone to get hurt because of him.

“What are you doing?” He tore his gaze away from the wall when he realized he was losing focus again.

Hun’s fingers flexed over his phone’s keyboard. “Telling Pidge to hound on your ass every night so you’ll take your meds like you’re supposed to,” he said without looking up.

Lance bristled. “C’mon, man, that’s low, even for you!”

Once he finished (it took a solid minute; Hunk had always been a slow-typer), he set his phone down, frowning. “You always regret it when you don’t. I’m just trying to look out for you, dude.”

Lance let out a groan of defeat, panning a hand through his hair. “I know. I know. I just…” His voice was drowned out by a sudden uproar of static coming from his nightstand. Lance looked over his shoulder, then back at Hunk. “Sorry, Hunk, gotta go,” he said hurriedly, “Homework calls!”

“Yeah, yeah. Take your meds-!”

He shut the laptop screen then wheeled his chair over to the crackling radio. Pidge had worked her magic and hacked the hunk of junk so that it picked up law enforcement frequencies, and boy, did that make his life so much easier.  She hadn’t even asked why he would request such a peculiar thing; she just willingly obliged with no questions (though she did require the latest installment of Killbot Phantom 1 in exchange for her ‘services’).

He was at least 75 percent positive that she knew about Lance’s double life, and had quietly claimed the title of his tacitly sidekick. He didn’t mind the arrangement, really; it was nice to have a friend who turned a blind eye to his “late-night studies” and poor excuses for the endless amount of bruises and bandaids that littered his terra-cotta skin.

The exchange was pretty hard to make out through the static, but he was still able to pick up on the important stuff and get a idea what he was dealing with.

_“ —45th Lalet Avenue, in pursuit —”_

_“—Male, black hair, masked—”_

_“—Reason to believe he is Pyromancer—”_

_Pyro again, huh?_ He thought, raising a brow. _You never give up, do you, hot-shot?_

Lance looked over at the pill bottle sitting only a few inches away.

He extended his arm, hand passing the bottle to silence the radio beside it. “I’m going out, Blue!” he called to the grey feline lounging on his bed. She rolled over in response, tail curling and unfurling as she watched him enter the closet only to return in spandex.

His suit wasn’t anything fancy. It was blue, with a white horizontal V that stretched from his shoulders across his chest and a mask to match.  Originally he wanted something a little more flashy (apparently his crayon drawings were not suitable references), but the simple suit had grown on him. Besides, he looked just as great in tight spandex as he did in yoga pants.

He stopped at the door, turning to wink at the russian blue. “Hold down the fort for me, a’ight?”

Lance opened the door and looked out at the sleeping city, pausing to take in the cold night air.

So much for beauty sleep.

  
-

Lance, at one point, had been on his school track team.

It wasn’t an additional superhero capacity that aided him but his ridiculously long legs as he took off down the dimly-lit street, hardly breaking a sweat. He always imagined he would get some sweet hot rod for appropriate superhero transportation, but turns out none of those super-secret hero organizations were that generous.

It also turned out heroes didn’t make a lot of revenue from their ass-kicking unless they were contracted to a justice organization, like Voltron. Lance had been tempted (being a part of the Voltron league and working along-side Champion would be a dream come true - well, if not for the fact Champion had gone incognito) but it involved a lot of paperwork and exposure. Lance wasn’t looking to sell his soul; the life of a vigilante was dangerous enough, but it would only put a larger target on his head. Which, inevitably, put a target on all of his loved ones, too.

The thought of losing Hunk, or Pidge, or his vastly large family - heck, even the cute flower boy who worked across the street - was something he didn’t want to think about.

He was eventually being greeted by a crowd of onlookers and a line of police attempting to hold them back.  Just ahead, a jewelry store’s alarms screeched mercilessly, waking the sleepy city and the restless hero from his thoughts.

Lance weaved his way through the sea of civilians and made his way to the front.  “Never fear, Blue Dexterous is here,” he announced a little too loudly, shooting a few girls finger guns who physically swooned.

Yeah, he’d never get tired of that.

Once inside, he was greeted by a familiar face.

Or, rather, a familiar mask.

“Well, if it ain’t Pyro.” Lance had one hand on his hip. The other was enveloped in a flurry of white, licking at his hand like flames of temperamental ice.

“It’s Pyromancer,” came his opposer’s irritated response.

He turned, eyes narrowed behind a dark purple mask. He was clad in a suit of grey and black hues, with lightly glowing vertical and horizontal details across the front. Even Lance could admit he looked dang good in it, but the suit didn’t exactly concede with his power.

it would be like Lance wearing a flaming red suit, even though his power dealt with the manipulation of cold and ice.

Pyromancer was an enigma amongst the villains and petty criminals Lance had dealt with. He showed up out of nowhere two months ago in a fancy getup and started reaping the city of what little peace it clung to after the disappearance of Champion.  He wasn’t trying to make a name for himself like most villains, though; he seemed less than interested in butting heads with Dexterous, and always made an effort to get in and out as quickly and discretely as possible.  

“Yeah, yeah, but Pyro is so much cooler,” Lance, or rather, _Dexterous_ , insisted, frowning.

“And this is coming from the guy who calls himself Blue Dexterous?” Pyro looked unimpressed.

“Hey! It has a nice ring to it. ‘Sides, the chicks totally dig it.”

Lance paused, looking over the shattered and mostly empty jewelry case. “I hate to break it to you, hot stuff, but this is grossly clichè. There’s literally a bank across the st-”

Pyro rushed at him before he could finish, his hands ablaze. Lance was ready, of course. He didn't attempt to barrel into the raven-haired villain.  Instead, he strained his body and then pushed it upwards, leaping off the ground and out of his line of fire in one effortless motion.

Lance landed neatly in the spot the other had been, hands on his hips. “If you wanted my autograph that bad, you could have just asked!”

“I don’t think your fangirls would like that,” mullet retorted.

“Neither would the fanboys. News flash, buddy: superheroes can swing both ways, and I’m not just talking about these pretty fists.”

Pyro’s eyes flashed, but if he was surprised by his words, he didn’t say anything. He wasn’t much of a talker, that one.

Lance made the next move, and this time they clashed.

It was always like this - a game of cat and dog, if you will. They always fought, both landing a few blows before Pyro eventually found an opening for escape. Sometimes he got away with whatever he was trying to accomplish or steal, and other times he got away with only the tight suit on his back.

Tonight was no different, only the distraction happened to be a small child.

They had somehow managed to evade the attention of their mother, and slipped past the line of police, inevitably finding themselves in the line of fire.

Pyro didn’t realize until it was too late, and a ball of fire was hurtling towards the little boy at full-speed.

Lance shot forward without a second thought, wrapping his arms around the boy and shielding him from the blast. The fire just barely skimmed his backside as they both tumbled down, but he still felt a flash of pain as it ate away part of his suit and tasted skin.

The boy began to sob, and for a heartbeat he thought it was out of fear of what almost was, until he began to babble incoherently about how ‘cool Dex is’, and he smiled into his curly hair with relief.  When he looked up, the smile had vanished, replaced by narrowed eyes. “Nice work, hothead.”

“I didn’t…” Pyro swallowed the tremble in his voice, slowly taking a few steps back as he stared wide-eyed at the crying child.  With that, he was gone, taking the bag of stolen crystals with him.

When Lance dragged himself back home, the first thing he did was check the burn in his bathroom mirror.

To his utter bewilderment, the burn had disappeared.

 

  
-

Keith hated flowers.

They were a constant reminder that everything in life was temporary; that even the most beautiful people eventually wilted, and left him behind.

He was a forget-me-not amongst the roses - and no one ever stopped by to purchase a bouquet of those.

So why, one might ask, did he work at a flower shop.

Easy: It paid the bills, and it was exactly the kind of lifestyle a shoujo protagonist led.

Well, this and the shop was actually Shiro’s before he took a leave of absence.

“If anything happens to me, Keith, I want _you_ to run the shop,” Shiro had said to him one day, feigning seriousness.  He proceeded to chuckle, and Keith punched his arm, smirking.

He didn’t want to think about the subtle delicacy that had laced his step-brother’s words.

The raven-haired boy removed his mask, tossing it on the unmade bed. He shed the rest of the suit, too, letting it pool at his feet before stepping out.

Outside, the first streaks of pink began to grace the sky.  Keith glanced up at the bulletin board above his desk.  When he was younger, it was scattered with conspiracy theories. There may or may not have been a love letter to mothman somewhere on it, too, though it’s current whereabouts were confidential.

In it’s place now was a map of the city. Red thumb-tacks dotted numerous locations, some connected with string. Above it, there was a photo of Shiro holding a much younger Keith on his shoulders. They were both grinning at the camera, not a care in the world.  Shiro had a baseball cap on and was sporting baggy cargo pants. His hair was still black back then, and he didn’t have an undercut. He looked happier.  His smile looked genuine.

Keith was wearing overalls with an alien patch and another that said “I want to believe” on the front. He was sporting a missing tooth, too, and wild hair. Shiro used to call him a ragamuffin for his unkept appearance.

The photo was there to take away the guilt when he removed a thumbtack, and to remind him why he put the suit on every day and fought obnoxious heroes with stupid names like Blue Dexterous.

_For Shiro._

He spent the last hours of dawn revising the board and making plans for his next mission.

After showering, he changed and headed downstairs, going through his morning prep list whilst chugging down bitter coffee. Afterwards he turned the open sign over and retreated behind the counter.

He had just finished tying his apron when the door chimed, and a particular yogi with chocolate brown hair and eyes as blue as the sea entered like he owned the place, flashing Keith a smile that was way too bright for it being 8 AM on a Monday.

He mentally groaned.

“How’s my favorite flower boy this beautiful morning?” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Lance's suit is pretty much the one he wears in the healing pod, but reverse colors  
> and Keith's is literally just his blade of mamora suit  
> yeah, i'm terrible at descriptions.. and being creative in general
> 
> anyways, brownie points if you can point out the sunflower you lost reference..
> 
> [twitter](https://twitter.com/peachii_keef)  
> [tumblr](http://peachiikeenteen.tumblr.comf)  
> 


	2. a bergamot and tobacco kind of guy

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> wow, this is super overdue. i would apologize but..well, life, man.  
> hopefully updates will come a bit more frequently now that the sunflower you lost is coming to a close.

What do you want, Lance?”

Keith let his hands back fall to his side, shooting the visiter an irritable side-glance.

He fixed his attention on the cash register afterwards, deciding he might as well count the till while Lance was present. Getting rid of the Cuban boy was nearly impossible, but he could at least multi-task in his presence. It was an expertise of sorts he had mastered after putting up with his torment for one too many early mornings.

The yogi merely flashed him a toothy grin, leaning over the counter like Keith was a cute girl and he was trying to woo her with a nonchalant - and very practiced - pose.

Lance had been coming to the flower shop for a few weeks now. The first day he visited, Keith actually hadn’t minded his company. In fact, he had been practically infatuated with him (something he would never admit, especially not when it would just feed the guy’s immensely large and obnoxious ego).

He was beautiful, for a better lack of words. The kind of beauty that isn’t necessarily effortless, but still leaves you breathless and wanting more.

His skin was a dark but warm brown tone, like an expresso on a particularly chilly morning. It was dappled with the faintest of freckles, suggesting an adventurous childhood spent outside. His curly locks were a shade lighter, like the caramel drizzle that dilutes the expresso’s bitterness. Some days it looked curler than others; Keith had a theory Lance straightened it when he found the time. It was his eyes, however, that stole the breath from his lungs when he waltzed through the doors of the flower shop for the first time.

It was like having a glimpse right into the heart of the ocean. They were the the most brilliant indigo blue eyes Keith had ever seen.

And they had looked right at him, as if Keith was the prettiest flower in the shop.

He was certain he was fated to fall madly in love with those eyes.

Then Lance had to go and open mouth.

He wasn’t quite the romantic his looks comprised, to say the least.

Keith was convinced that the guy had dedicated his efforts to irritating him to death ever since. It wouldn’t surprise him, anyways. Lance seemed like the motivated type.

“Aw, come on, babe. You know how much I love seeing your pretty face.” Lance was inspecting a bouquet of crème roses and white lilies. There were a few blue carnations nestled within the flowers to contrast the white spread.

Keith noticed the faintest flicker of equivocal emotion within Lance’s eyes as he reached a hand to cup one of the lilies. “This one’s new. What’s the occasion?”

“Not every bouquet needs a specific occasion,” Keith reminded him with a sigh. “I leave that up to the customer.”

“Yeah, but…” the brunette tilted his head, studying the flowers. His earlier grin had melted into a thoughtful frown. The expression didn’t really suit him. “I don’t know, the flowers seem a little sad. Like…an “I’m sorry” sort of bouquet.”

Keith stopped. Something in his chest began to writhe and kick, and he stopped counting the money to shoot him a glare. “Don’t you have a yoga class to instruct?”

Lance’s expression seemed to fall at that, but he was grinning again before Keith could question it. “Nah, I’m taking a little break from instructing.”

Well, that explained why he was wearing casual attire rather than the usual tight yoga pants and tank top with some stupid phrase on it like “Actually a mermaid”.

The raven-haired boy narrowed his eyes. It was now that he noticed just how exhausted Lance actually looked. His skin looked pallid compared to the rich vibrancy it normally held. His clothes were rumpled, too, like they had been snatched from the hamper without a second glance.

What stuck out the most, though, was his eyes - they were rimmed with dark circles, heavy enough to suggest he hadn’t slept much, if not at all, last night. It also explained why his hair looked curlier than usual today.

“Does it have something to do with the fact that you look like shit?” he questioned, mercilessly.

Lance’s eyebrows knit together. He straightened up, crossing his arms over his broadened chest. “Seriously? Coming from the guy who wears the eyeliner pencil in shade ‘dark circles for days’?”

Keith scoffed. He opened his mouth, then closed it, withdrawing a sigh rather than a well-aimed insult. Arguing with Lance was one never-ending loop he didn’t want to get sucked into right now. “Look, I’m busy.”

Lance didn’t have to call bullshit; the shop’s silence that followed his words did it for him. “Can’t you find another flower shop to idle in?”

Lance looked like he had a delicious answer in store (“ _none of the other shops have a cute flower boy working at them_ ”), but before he could get a word in something vibrated in his pants pocket.

He fished out his phone, read something on the screen, and began to type. A few texts were exchanged before his expression seemed to cloud a little. He looked up to send Keith a slanted smirk afterwards. “Duty calls.”

He saluted the flower boy, then promptly exited the shop, calling behind him “Try not to miss me too much!”

“I think I’ll manage.”

Clearly, _something_ had bothered him, enough to actually say adieu to Keith on a moment’s notice. Not that he cared.

Rather, he had simply begun to notice Lance’s odd behavior since he starting coming by — like the way the Cuban would feign a smile whenever he began to look troubled.

Lance was particularly good at that — pretending. Keith wondered why that was.

  
-

 

(8:12 AM) Pigeon (Pidge Gunderson): Where are you?  
(8:13 AM) Pigeon (Pidge Gunderson): Please tell me you aren’t annoying that flower shop guy  
(8:13 AM) Lancelot (Lance McClain): relax, i was just leaving.  
(8:13 AM) Lancelot (Lance McClain): i’ll have you know he loves my visits  
(8:15 AM) Pigeon (Pidge Gunderson): Sure he does. Listen, I really need you  
(8:15 AM) Lancelot (Lance Mcclain): oh?  
(8:16 AM) Pigeon (Pidge Gunderson): It’s about Matt  
(8:16 AM) Lancelot (Lance McClain): oh  
(8:17 AM) Pigeon (Pidge Gunderson): Can you meet me at Altea’s?  
(8:18 AM) Lancelot (Lance McClain): roger

 

  
-

“Alright, I have one flat white and one caramel macchiato with almond milk, extra whipped cream, and -” the barista paused as she set the drinks down, giving Lance a short glance, “three shots of expresso.”

Lance fixed her a big smile, pretending not to notice as he wrapped his fingers around his cup’s handle. “Thanks Allura, you’re a doll.”

Th taller woman frowned at him, placing one hand on her hip as she studied his chocolate features skeptically. She looked like she wanted to say something, but produced an unimpressed hum instead, her thick white pony-tail striking the air behind her as turned and made her way over to a customer waving an empty cup in her direction.

“That was weird,” he settled for once she had left.

When he lifted his eyes, Pidge was looking at him with furrowed brows. “Yeah, well, you never pump your usual with that much caffeine.” She pushed her glasses further up her nose, then leaned back into her chair, arms crossed. “You look awful.”

Lance feigned hurt. “Not all of us can pull off the ‘sleep-deprived’ look as well as you, Pigeon.”

“Hunk is worried about you.”

“Hunk is worried about everything.”

Pidge produced a sigh. She took a sip of her drink, then promptly set it down. “You don’t ever take your meds. You clearly aren’t sleeping, either. And you drink coffee more than you drink tea nowadays.”

Lance pretended to take an interest in the mountain of whipped cream atop his drink. He used his spoon to scoop off the very top, then popped it in his mouth, looking over the smaller girl. She was drowning in an oversized green sweater, and two earrings that he guessed were cactuses hung from her ears. Cute, he thought.

“Why are you smiling?”

“Because you’re cute.”

Her face flushed, and she leaned over the table to swat him. “Shut up.”

Lance dodged with a soft laugh. He stopped, however, pressing his lips together. “You didn’t call me here to harp on my poor life choices.”

The messy-haired brunette’s eyes narrowing at that, as though calculating whether she should tread on his attempt to change the subject. It must have worked, because a moment later she was twisting around to retrieve some things from inside her backpack hanging over the chair.

“I was doing more digging on Matt last night,” she began, placing a few articles on the table between them. “And I found something.”

Lance leaned over to look over the display of articles. “These are all about Champion’s disappearance,” he noted.

“Precisely. See the date?”

In all the article, the date of Champion’s disappearance was circled in red marker.

“March 25th,” he said, then frowned. “I’m not really following.”

“March 25th,” Pidge repeated, using that voice when she was on the verge of cracking something big.  She jabbed one of the red circles with her finger, looking up at him intently. “That’s two weeks before Matt went missing.”

The Cuban allowed a moment to let her words sink in. He took a sip of his macchiato, kissing the rim of the cup. It wasn’t news to Lance — but he never thought to consider that there might some correlation as to why the dates were so close. “So you’re saying that there might be a connection between them,” he concluded, setting his cup down.

“Matt acted strangely right before he went missing,” Pidge continued. “He was really on edge, and he seemed upset. Matt always talked to me when he was bothered, but he wouldn’t that time. It was like he was hiding something.” Her fingers tightened around her mug. “Like he knew he was going to go missing.”

Lance hummed thoughtfully. He was tempted to reach over and take the girl’s hand, but he decided against it. Pidge wasn’t a touchy-feely type person; if she wanted to be comforted, she would come to you, not the other way around.

“I’ll look into it,” he said finally. “I promise, Pidge, we’ll find him.”

“I know,” came Pidge’s response, not skipping a beat.

Despite the passing days since her brother was announced missing and the police retired their investigation, Pidge hadn’t lost hope for a second. She just wasn’t that kind of girl.

Lance smiled at her confidence despite the underlying worry in his stomach.

If Matt really was connected to Champion’s disappearance - what exactly did that mean? Was it possible her brother was involved with Voltron?

It seemed unlikely, but then again, he hadn’t known Matt Holt all that well.

If there was one thing Lance had learned from his work as a vigilante, it’s that no one was really who they seemed to be.

“Well,” the brunette said, getting to his feet, “As much as I’d love to continue this conversation, I have a register to man at the shop, and I’m not sure a public establishment is the best place to do that. Let’s plan to investigate your theory more tomorrow, ‘kay, Pigeon?”

She looked like she wanted to complain, but reluctantly nodded, leaning back into her seat. “Fine,” Pidge sighed, waving him off. “Come by my house after work tomorrow. Bring snacks.”

“Will do,” Lance said, heading towards the door.

“And for the love of god, get some sleep tonight,” he heard her call after him.

“No promises!”

 

  
  
-

  
He wasn’t disappointed, so much as curious when the pretty flower boy turned up unannounced in Lance’s natural habitat, wearing sweats and a face that could scare away even the most persistent store clerk.

When their eyes met, regret crashed over Keith’s face like a tsunami.

He started to creep back towards the door, ducking his head as to be discreet, but Lance was already picking his way past the register. “Whoah, whoah, _whoah_. Hold your horses, tulip-boy.”

“Um, sorry. Wrong establishment,” Keith muttered, looking anywhere but the yogi’s face as he approached. He seemed to realize escape was inevitable, however, because he reluctantly turned away from the door in defeat, upper-lip sticking out.

“Don’t be modest. I knew you’d fall prey to my charm eventually,” Lance said with a wide grin. Boy, he was excited. Probably a little bit more excited than he should have been.

But Keith was _here_. Where Lance _worked_. Why else would he have come, except to find company in the most gorgeous yogi the city had to offer?

“I came to get a candle,” Keith explained in a grumble, crossing his arms over his chest. “This is the only place that carries the brand I like for the shop.”

_Oh._

His eyes narrowed. “You said you were taking a break from instructing classes.”

“Sure, from classes.” Lance shrugged. “Not the register.”

“Figures,” Keith sighed, palming the back of his neck. It wasn’t pulled back.

Lance squinted. Did he always have a mullet?

“What is it?” Keith asked. “What’re you staring at?”

“I was just thinking, your mullet looks sort of familiar.”

He bristled at that. “I don’t have a mullet.”

Lance snorted. “Yeah, and I don’t look smoking hot in tight yoga pants.” He gestured for Keith to follow him over to a shelf lined with an assortment of different soy candles.

“You like the bergamot and tobacco, right?” He picked the candle in question from the shelf, then extended it towards the other. “I always smell it when I come by the shop.”

Keith looked down at the candle for a moment before taking it, then blinked once, looking back up at him with an expression he couldn’t quite read. “Uh..thanks.”

He ended up buying two of the tobacco and bergamot. Once Lance was finished ringing him up, he placed the candles in a bag and slid it over the counter towards the flower shop owner.

“Let me walk you home,” Lance blurted.

Keith gave him a inquisitive look. “I live right across the street, my apartments right above the shop.”

Well, okay. That was new information. “Still. It's late,” Lance persisted. “There’s crazies out there. Let me close up real quick, and I’ll walk you over.”

Keith looked like he wanted to argue, but just shrugged instead. “Fine.”

Lance stared at him in silence for a few heartbeats.

“ _What?_ ” Keith sounded more annoyed this time.

“Im just surprised you would accept such a ridiculous request.”

That received him a whack on the shoulder.

It succeeded in knocking him over, and Keith spent an eternity apologizing when he realized he had been rougher than he initially intended.

…He was a lot stronger than he looked.

 

  
-

 

“So, are you a fanboy?”

The raven-haired boy shot him a questioning glance as Lance locked the doors of the yoga studio.

“‘Fanboy’?”

“Yeah. Fanboy. Do you gawk over superheroes? Did you dream of fighting crime with Voltron as a tot? Do you have a shrine of Lady Lightning in your closet?”

Keith made a face. “No. No, not in the slightest. …Do you?”

Lance grinned, leading the way across the street. He stuffed his hands in the pockets of the hoodie he had thrown over his tee-shirt, taking in the brisk night air as they walked. “Everyone should have a shrine of Lady Lightning in their closet. She’s a total babe.”

“I don’t like superheroes.”

It was so quiet and sudden, Lance almost didn’t catch it. He tilted his head to the side, frowning at Keith. “Don’t like them? Why’s that?”

Keith was glaring at the ground now. He came to a stop once they reached the front of the flower shop, and Lance noticed his hands had curled into fists at his side. “They try so hard to protect people who don’t deserve it. And where does it get them? Missing.”

The brunette studied him, confused. “Missing? Do you mean Champion?”

That seemed to hit a sore spot, because Keith immediately tore his eyes from the ground to glare daggers at him.

“Thanks for walking me home. Let’s not do this again. Good night.”

He shut the door in Lance’s face before he could get a word in.

After a moment or two of processing whatever the hell had just happened, the hero ran a hand through his hair. He let out a tepid sigh and peered up at the moon. “What’s his deal?”

Silence.

The moon wasn’t a very talkative guy, but he was a good listener, at the very least.

_Just when I thought I was making progress, too._

Even so, Keith’s words had stuck with him.

 _They try so hard to protect people who don’t deserve it,_ he said

What exactly did he mean by that? And why the animosity towards such a selfless hero like Champion?

Keith was an odd fellow, he decided.

Lance wasn’t going to give up on him quite yet, though.

He would have to recognize the face of his high school rival eventually.

Right?

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i'm -potentially- looking for a beta to help me out aboard this angsty ride, so if you're interested give me a holler.
> 
> [twitter](https://twitter.com/peachii_keef)  
> [tumblr](http://peachiikeenteen.tumblr.com)  
> 


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